Fire starter?

Share this:

Did a 61-year-old former computer programmer living in bus shelters on the streets of San Francisco torch more than a dozen cars last month?

San Francisco police suspect so. But it is hardly a slam dunk case against the suspect, Fafa Chan.

What’s the evidence? Well, not a lot. Police Capt. Al Pardini told a Board of Supervisors committee this week that there’s no physical evidence against Chan, but that since she was arrested July 30, no more cars have been set ablaze. (Update: At least not until early Thursday, when someone tried to set a Honda Accord on fire at 21st Avenue and Balboa Street.)

Police say Chan set fires at two buildings in the city this year in which, like the car torch jobs, newspapers were used as kindling.

But the case against her on the building fires is not exactly ironclad, either. Last week, a judge tossed out charges against Chan in one of them, a July 24 fire on Otis Street.

The court did find enough evidence to hold her for an arson at First and Mission streets on April 30. Damage in that caper? $500.

Records show that Chan was sentenced to two years state prison in 1994 stemming from a 1991 fire.

Chan’s attorney, Matthew Rosen, said the police suggestion that his client may be involved the car fires is character assassination, given that they’ve produced no evidence against her.

“I haven’t been provided with anything,” he said. “In my case, she is charged with setting a stack of newspapers on fire near a building.”